Golden Face
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Introduction
Introduction
** Office story of threat level midnight and golden face
We are going to talk about the OG goldenface
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And he said, I beseech thee, shew me thy glory. And he said, I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee; and will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will shew mercy on whom I will shew mercy. And he said, Thou canst not see my face: for there shall no man see me, and live. And the Lord said, Behold, there is a place by me, and thou shalt stand upon a rock: And it shall come to pass, while my glory passeth by, that I will put thee in a clift of the rock, and will cover thee with my hand while I pass by: And I will take away mine hand, and thou shalt see my back parts: but my face shall not be seen.
And the Lord said unto Moses, Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first: and I will write upon these tables the words that were in the first tables, which thou brakest. And be ready in the morning, and come up in the morning unto mount Sinai, and present thyself there to me in the top of the mount.
And it came to pass, when Moses came down from mount Sinai with the two tables of testimony in Moses’ hand, when he came down from the mount, that Moses wist not that the skin of his face shone while he talked with him. And when Aaron and all the children of Israel saw Moses, behold, the skin of his face shone; and they were afraid to come nigh him. And Moses called unto them; and Aaron and all the rulers of the congregation returned unto him: and Moses talked with them. And afterward all the children of Israel came nigh: and he gave them in commandment all that the Lord had spoken with him in mount Sinai. And till Moses had done speaking with them, he put a vail on his face. But when Moses went in before the Lord to speak with him, he took the vail off, until he came out. And he came out, and spake unto the children of Israel that which he was commanded. And the children of Israel saw the face of Moses, that the skin of Moses’ face shone: and Moses put the vail upon his face again, until he went in to speak with him.
1. Moses Desired (33:18-19)
1. Moses Desired (33:18-19)
a) to see the Lord
Moses was one of the greatest Men of God to ever walk the earth. He is every Jewish person’s hero. He wrote the Torah, or Pentateuch, which is the first five books of the Bible. Usually by the time a child is a teenager they would have all of the Torah memorized: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, the books that Moses wrote. Moses knew and understood the seriousness and significance of getting to know the God of the Universe. He wanted to know this God as much as possible, so he asked to see Him.
— Moses, the man who God had already been convening with. He had already used him to free the Jewish people from Pharaoh and Egypt, and to part the red sea, and wander around in the desert, he had already been talking with God daily, and yet, he still wanted to know God more, he wanted to have a deeper and more meaningful relationship with Him. He wanted to see God
Why did Moses seem to want to know God so much more here in this passage?
— He had been through heartbreak.
And Moses turned, and went down from the mount, and the two tables of the testimony were in his hand: the tables were written on both their sides; on the one side and on the other were they written. And the tables were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, graven upon the tables. And when Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said unto Moses, There is a noise of war in the camp. And he said, It is not the voice of them that shout for mastery, neither is it the voice of them that cry for being overcome: but the noise of them that sing do I hear. And it came to pass, as soon as he came nigh unto the camp, that he saw the calf, and the dancing: and Moses’ anger waxed hot, and he cast the tables out of his hands, and brake them beneath the mount. And he took the calf which they had made, and burnt it in the fire, and ground it to powder, and strawed it upon the water, and made the children of Israel drink of it. And Moses said unto Aaron, What did this people unto thee, that thou hast brought so great a sin upon them? And Aaron said, Let not the anger of my lord wax hot: thou knowest the people, that they are set on mischief. For they said unto me, Make us gods, which shall go before us: for as for this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him. And I said unto them, Whosoever hath any gold, let them break it off. So they gave it me: then I cast it into the fire, and there came out this calf.
— He was supposed to be the leader of these people, leading them spiritually to be God’s chosen people, and yet here they are dancing naked worshipping a golden calf.
Brother Andrew at camp mentioned how over the years he’s been here, he has seen teens that were in the youth just basically forget about Christianity and only care about themselves and their own lives, and how man it will break your heart to see the people that you were the spiritual leader for go and forsake their spiritual lives and their faith.
— Well imagine Moses in this instance, an entire nation, thousands and thousands of people who were supposed to be God’s chosen people were left alone for a few days, a few days, and they made an idol and began to worship it.
Why did these people worship this golden calf?
They let themselves get bored of their own God. They didn’t desire to worship Him or obey Him anymore, they got tired of the same old god and made their own.
Do not, DO NOT, let yourself get bored with Christianity. The only reason you are bored with your religion is exactly that, because to you its only religion. Christianity is more than a religion, it is a relationship. I know that’s cliche, but that is the catastrophic difference between Christianity and every other religion. In every other religion, man is working his way up to try to get to God. But in Christianity, God came down to man.
(You preach) The very God that simply spoke the world into existence… came down to earth to die…
THAT, is the difference between Christianity and every other religion.
If you diligently seek the Lord and His presence in your life like Moses did, you will not get bored with Christianity. A relationship with your creator God is the most interesting, awe inspiring, meaningful thing you will ever take part in in your entire life. Do not, DO NOT let yourself become stagnant and get bored with your faith.
After everything Moses had been through with God, he still desired to know Him more, to see Him and hear from Him.
O taste and see that the Lord is good:
Blessed is the man that trusteth in him.
What do you want? In life in general or right now, what do you want most? What are the top three things you want the most right now? think about it
… Were any of those things God? To know Him more?
If you don’t have godly desires, then you need to change your desires. And you can ask God to change your desires to His desires and He will.
I’ve told yall the story of going to camp and surrendering to the ministry. That call to the ministry started with a prayer the first day of camp asking God to change my desires to His desires.
So Moses desired to be closer to the Lord, so
2. God Commanded (34:1-3)
2. God Commanded (34:1-3)
a) God commanded him to remake the tablets
When Moses had come down from the Mountain the first time when he saw the nation of Israel dancing and worshipping a false god, he was so overcome with rage and despair that he threw the original 10 commandments tablets on the ground and broke them. So God commanded him to go back up the mountain to get a new set of tablets. And Moses obeyed.
b) He wrote the Law
The ten commandments are a concise summary of all of the jewish law. There are 613 laws that the Jews must follow. When ever they reach their Bar Mitzvah, they are required to follow all of these laws and will be held accountable for when they break them, whereas before then their parents were held accountable for their actions.
So Moses wrote the Book of the Law, or the Torah including Leviticus, which is the book has all of those crazy rules in it.
Keeping the law never saved the Jews from their sins. The way of salvation has always been the same.
For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.
And he believed in the Lord; and he counted it to him for righteousness.
Moses’s obedience to God revealed his faith in God. The same way that our obedience to God reveals our faith in Him.
Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?
Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works.
So we know that we are not saved by our works, only by faith, but our works or fruit shows that we have faith.
Because Moses loved the Lord and desired to have a close and meaningful relationship with Him, he didn’t mind serving Him and following His commandments. Whenever you have a joyful relationship with the Lord, then it is a joy to serve Him. When you fall in love with God, you fall in love with serving Him.
So we aren’t under the law anymore obviously but he does have commandments for his church. Like this one
And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.
And we should be glad to do it
Serve the Lord with gladness:
Come before his presence with singing.
So God commanded Moses to come up and spend some time talking with him, and so
3. Moses Obeyed (34:4-8)
3. Moses Obeyed (34:4-8)
And he hewed two tables of stone like unto the first; and Moses rose up early in the morning, and went up unto mount Sinai, as the Lord had commanded him, and took in his hand the two tables of stone. And the Lord descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the Lord. And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, Keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, unto the third and to the fourth generation. And Moses made haste, and bowed his head toward the earth, and worshipped.
Moses obeyed, he did what God had asked of him. He made the stone tablets, carried them up the mountain, and spent time with God.
Sometimes it’s a little difficult to spend time with God, it will take some effort to spend time with God.
There’s all sorts of distractions in life that can deter us from spending time with God. And sometimes we have to make sacrifices, cutting certain things out of our lives to insure we get to spend that time with Him. Like maybe sleep. Maybe waking up 15 or 20 minutes earlier in the morning will allow us to spend some time with Him before we get our day started.
But making that sacrifice is so worth it in order to spend time with Jesus every morning.
After Moses had spent all that time with the Lord, you could tell.
And he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights; he did neither eat bread, nor drink water. And he wrote upon the tables the words of the covenant, the ten commandments.
And it came to pass, when Moses came down from mount Sinai with the two tables of testimony in Moses’ hand, when he came down from the mount, that Moses wist not that the skin of his face shone while he talked with him. And when Aaron and all the children of Israel saw Moses, behold, the skin of his face shone; and they were afraid to come nigh him. And Moses called unto them; and Aaron and all the rulers of the congregation returned unto him: and Moses talked with them. And afterward all the children of Israel came nigh: and he gave them in commandment all that the Lord had spoken with him in mount Sinai. And till Moses had done speaking with them, he put a vail on his face. But when Moses went in before the Lord to speak with him, he took the vail off, until he came out. And he came out, and spake unto the children of Israel that which he was commanded. And the children of Israel saw the face of Moses, that the skin of Moses’ face shone: and Moses put the vail upon his face again, until he went in to speak with him.
God’s glory was rubbing off on Moses. His face was shining with the glory of God. People knew he was different, they could see it. They knew that it was because he had spent time with God.
And people will know if you and I spend time with God or not. They will know us by our fruits. Do you have good fruit or bad fruit?
If you have good fruit, then your light is shining.
Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.
**Yall remember the sunday school song, this little light of mine? (sing it)
We are living in some dark, dark times. Seems as if the world is trying to shut itself down, people are rioting and killing eachother, politics are crazy, we are living in some dark times.
The world needs hope, they need the light. They need Christ. And you are the one to show them the light, to give them hope, to show them Christ.
Is your face shining, like Moses’s was when he had been with the Lord? Are you letting your light shine to the world around you?